The myth Corbyn is heading for victory is destroying the Labour leadership race

A highly destructive dynamic has taken hold of Labour’s leadership contest. Because it makes good copy and because there’s some vague evidence of support for Corbyn, it is his candidacy that is getting all the attention.

This is killing the debate about the economy, public finances, welfare and the future of public services that Labour needs to have. This suits the candidacies of Yvette Cooper and Andy Burnham just fine. It is a disaster for the Labour Party.

The BBC Sunday Politics hustings today showed this dynamic in full clarity. Yvette Cooper put in a performance that was not only poor but if repeated in a General Election campaign would be election losing. It was reminiscent of Ed Miliband’s showing at the Question Time programme during the election. His denials over Labour and spending were completely torn apart. Quite simply, Labour was over-borrowing before the crash and the failure to be absolutely clear about that is a highway to defeat.

Cooper’s denials enabled Burnham to position himself as a fiscally responsible candidate. He’s no such thing. Both he and Cooper racked up somewhere in the region of £10billion or so of unfunded spending commitments during a 60 minute hustings. Imagine what they would accumulate in five years. Cooper leapt on Liz Kendall’s idea to establish a commission looking at tax allowances to see if they could be used to reverse cuts to credits. So who is leading whom here?

Burnham claims he is pro-business but he wouldn’t let the private sector anywhere near the health service. So business can’t be trusted after all. On issue after issue Cooper and Burnham talk one way but their instincts point in a different direction. We know how this ends up- ask Ed Miliband.

All of this is going completely unexamined because of the Corbyn obsession. Well done to those who nominated him but don’t support him. You’ve really done the party a service.

Corbyn is not going to win. If he did it would show a party completely incapable of realistic politics anyhow- there’s no job of persuasion that can work anyhow if that is where it has ended up. So ignore him. It is the candidacies of Kendall, Cooper, and Burnham that we should be scrutinising. And when we do, we will see from two of those candidacies that Labour is repeating *all* the same errors of the last five years. Time is running out.

(All these blogs are written in a personal capacity.)